the stump


    From my grandfather’s tin lunch pail


    he fingered the stick of dynamite


    taken from the mine and now out of sight,


    ready to be lit and wail.


    He selected his victim with care,


    an ancient cathedral-like stump


    with defaced roots and twisted rotting bumps;


    he planned violently to tear


    through the roots and fleshy dry bark


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    with liquid fire, black bomb powder.


    He waited impatiently to try his power.


    The first silence was stark


    as he struck the fuse, knowing that


    his wife was at church and would not


    stop his scheme; he couldn’t be caught.


    Fire breathed, he drew back, sat


    waiting for the flight of this tree’s


    corpse, an explosive funeral,


    an image both strange and visceral.


    Powder shattered the breeze


    when the dynamite blew it up,


    the proud stump billowing toward


    the lake where two fishermen, who swore


    silently, threw enough


    of themselves out of their old boat


    to avoid strange death from above


    as the plundered, airborne stump broke in rough


    waves around the floaters.


    They plunged back into their small craft,


    not bothering to reel in their lines


    as they paddled off with oars of white pine.


    My grandfather just laughed.